Quality Craftmanship

I'm taking Antitrust this quarter. It's a good class. I would say that in combination with Business Organizations these two classes explain nearly everything that you read in the New York Times business section that seems to make no logical sense. Really, you want to understand the why of the business world these are must take classes. But that's besides the point...

Each week a different group presents to the class on a case study from the Professor. Thanks to twisted fate, I am assigned to a group that goes dead last. Our problem is probably the hardest, most complication question asked of any group. Add to this problem my failure to do much of the reading and you have an ever increasingly likelihood of my total failure. Or so you would think.

Turns out, no, I'm not the weak link in this particular three ring circus (check out that mixed metaphor). See, the rest of the group is comprised of 2Ls. My friends should remember this as a great time for me. You're fresh out of 1L and your summer internship. The world seems to be your oyster. Turns out that's just not true. See, you haven't learned how to process huge areas of the law that are presented in upper-division classes. You're still trying to fit the models that got you through 1L to actual law. You have yet to learn that you hardly know anything.

Prof. Drake, the Antitrust professor, isn't interested in outdated modes of legal analysis. He's interested in what's going to win the argument. What's your hook? Well, I've read the brief written by my able 2L teammates and I can say without equivocation... there is no hook. This wouldn't normally be a problem if we were taking the easy position, but we seem to have decided to argue the hard side. Which means you need more than just a hook... you need a fantastic hook.

This past day I've been reading up on all the relevant merger cases, refactoring the brief into a workable presentation that might actually have a hook. Otherwise I go before the class tomorrow and look quite the fool. I don't have a problem looking the fool, but it had better be of my own doing.